Big Brother
by DiscordantSymphony
Summary: He isn't super strong, he isn't fast and he isn't a genius. John Summers is just an average guy who loves his family, and he has to hope that is going to be enough when his little sister is called as the Slayer and puts her life at risk night after night after night.
1. Prologue

Big Brother

Prologue

How did the world go so damn wrong so damn quick?

John Summers had, in his opinion, a pretty great if boring life. A great Mum, an okay dad and a little sister he loved even if they were a little distant from one another considering that John was seventeen and she was fifteen. He had friends, a girlfriend, a life. But then all of it had sudden the entire goddamn world had fallen apart.

It had all started with the first murder, a classmate of theirs at Hemery had been found dead one night and according to some people, all her blood had been drained. Then another body had been found, and another and another and another. And then his sister started to spend more and more time out at night and she would never say where she had been.

And then one night, at one of the endless dances that Hemery always seemed to have, a group of freaks with weird faces attacked the gym. John couldn't explain what had happened, or why. All he knew at the end of that night, two things happened. One, his sister had saved his life and the life of everyone who had been there that day.

And also, she had burned down the gym. To be honest, that was the closest thing to John as he had always hated gym and had spent more than one idle fantasy dreaming of burning the accursed place down. He had taken great delight in the thought of burning down the rope he had never been able to climb, no could and he was certain of that. It was not a method of exercise but of torture.

But while the fantasy might have been awesome to see coming true, it was poor Buffy who had to live with the consequences. Expelled from school, exiled from her friends and held as dangerous by their own parents. Yeah, the world had gone mad. When Buffy stared to say that there were vampires and she was something called a "Slayer"...yeah, that had not gone over well.

Buffy had been sent to a mental hospital and came back a month later, not taking about a slayer and vampires and not really talking at all. The house had fallen silent, the only conversation seemed to only occur if their parents were arguing about something else. Which they were also in the middle of doing right now.

John winced when he heard his Father shout something at his Mom and then a few moments later there was the sound of the front door slamming shut and the sound crying drifting from upstairs. John sighed and made his way over to Buffy's door and pulled it open to see his sister sitting in the middle of the bed.

He had never seen her look so miserable in his life, Buffy had always been little miss sunlight for as long as he was able to remember. Quick to smiles, laughter and to be honest more than a little vapid. To see her quiet, subdued and despondent was wrong, not just in the big brother way of not wanting to see his sister sad, but almost like something was fundamentally wrong with the world.

She looked up from her feet and John could see that she had been crying, he climbed on to the bed next to her and pulled her close to him and a few moments later his sister was sobbing into his chest and he was soothing her as best he could. He wasn't exactly an expert when it came to this sort of thing.

Emotionally constipated, was being kind.

John honestly did not know how long they had stayed together like that, only he knew he heard the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs and he knew it had to be his mom on her way to bed and he heard his Father not coming back from wherever he had gone to, this was the first time his Father had not come back after an argument.

John clung to Buffy tighter and Buffy clung back to him just as firmly. "It's all my fault." The voice was so small, so quiet and so without any hope at all that for a moment John thought there had to be someone else in the room. His sister didn't sound like that, surely not. Some weird person had crept into her room and was blaming something on themselves, that was the saner alternative.

"No it's not." He was quick to offer, and there was truth in that and not just the sweet lie. Things between their parents had been rough for a long time even before Buffy had gotten into trouble. John had noticed and Buffy hadn't because, as much as he loved his sister, he could not deny that up until recently she had always been more than a little bit self involved. "It's not your fault, I promise."

"It is though." A hiccup followed by a deep breath and John knew now that they were on rotting ice, one wrong move and it was going to see them plunged into a lake of Buffy tears. "I'm the reason we're going to have to move away, I'm the reason that they going to get divorced and I'm the reason that Merrick's-"

John had know idea who Merrick was meant to be, he had never heard Buffy mention him before, but clearly for his sister he was the breaking point because as soon as she said his name she bent over and broke out sobbing and John held her that little more tightly, rubbing the back of her chest as she cried for her lost life.

John stayed with her until she cried herself to sleep and then got up and left the room once he had tucked her under the covers, he walked over to his parents room to check on his Mom and found her asleep under the covers already and so then John made his way to his own room, shutting the door as he walked inside and got under his own covers.

He let out a bone weary sigh and shut his eyes, maybe this was the best? Maybe this move was going to be good for all of them, a chance to get away and put every terrible thing that had happened here behind them. Mom had told them about this place they were going to, a niece little town near Santa Barbara with low crime rates, a club, a theater and a shopping mall with a school that was willing to take Buffy. The same sounded good as well, a new beginning.

Sunnydale.

End of Prologue

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**I hope you enjoyed this brief little prologue to set things up, most of this story will be from John's perspective but there will be a few perspective shifts every now and then.**

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**With love,**

**DiscordantSymphony**


	2. Chapter 1

Big Brother

Chapter One

The horse was nice and Sunnydale was pretty much what he had expected it to be, a nice quiet little town with nice little suburban homes with perfectly trimmed lawns and one high school, one medium sized mall, one movie theater, one gym. It was a normal town, but weirdly enough it had something like forty or more churches and near twenty graveyards which seemed to John as really, really weird.

Why would such a small town need so many burial places? It didn't have a large population at all and just then it occurred to John that his Mom had only just yesterday been talking about how odd it was that the property values in Sunnydale seemed so very low when on the surface it seemed to be a great town. But after what had been a couple of months of hell none of them had wanted to look a gift horse in the mouth and so they had moved and really thought nothing of it.

And really, what was the worst thing that could happen around here? A kid got their bike stolen, a lemonade stand got kicked down? This place was as normal as any place could possibly be. John looked away from the window when he heard his mom shout from the kitchen for his sister to get up and for the both of them to come and get breakfast, they were going to be late for school.

John walked into their new kitchen and sat at the island and a moment later Buffy came in after him, already dressed and hair neatly brushed and soon their Mom had two bowls of cereal put in front of them. "I would've made you both some pancakes but the pans and the measuring bowls are all in boxes somewhere so, cereal will have to do for now."

"Don't worry about it Mom, breakfast of champions." Buffy said with a smile that seemed more than a little painful to John's eyes. Back before everything had gone wrong, Buffy was more than willing to give Mom lip whenever something was not up to her exacting standards but ever since the gym had burned down Buffy had been quieter, more subdued.

It felt wrong, mind you. Most things felt wrong nowadays, he had come to that conclusion. At this point he was just going with the flow of it. The world was insane and didn't make any sense and that was just a feature, not a glitch and my god was he the most pretentious person alive? John dug his spoon into his bowl and popped some soggy cereal and milk into his mouth.

Soon enough the cereal was gone and they were in the car towards the eternal hell that would be school would be upon them. Sunnydale was not a huge town so it didn't take them more than ten minutes by car to get from their new house to their new school and so they soon pulled up in front of the school and we're getting out of the car.

John looked back at the car when he heard his Mother call out to his sister. "Try not to get kicked out!" And he wasn't able to stop a frown at that, it wasn't like Buffy ever had a habit of getting into trouble back Hemry, before those last couple of weeks Buffy had been one of the few students not to get in any trouble even if she wasn't massively bright.

"I won't Mom." Buffy said and John could practically hear the fake smile in her voice and once she turned it was there as plan as day on his face but John could always see through his sister and the sadness in her eyes was as plain as day. Once their Mom had driven off in their car John walked down to stand next to his sister and threw his arm over her shoulder.

"Well." He glanced at Buffy and then glanced back at the school. "We're here, a brand new hell. Let's get right into it and if we're lucky, we will survive it and wind up filliping burgers at the Doublemeat." Hey, it got a smile if nothing else and after the actual hell that the past couple months had been a smile was a victory.

The pair of them began to make their way up the stairs and towards the school when from behind them there was the sound of some sort of collusion, John stopped walking and turned around to see that some idiot had collided with the handrail of the stairs when he was on top of his skateboard, John shook his head and scoffed, well at least he could take some comfort in the fact that no matter where you went in the world, there was almost certain to be an idiot around somewhere.

Buffy had not stopped to look around and had already made her way inside of the school and John rushed to meet up with her, and the pair of them found themselves in the principal's office. Principal Flutie seemed nice, but also sort of nervous as well. Like he expected something was going to jump out at him and stab him.

The man had bid both of them to sit down and he spoke and his voice seemed as nervous as the rest of him. "A second chance, that's what you're going to get here Buffy. We don't see any troubled students here, we just see those who had a wrong start in life and get them back on the right track. It was after all not exactly a big thing you did so. This permanent record of yours?"

Flutie opened the folder and took out the paper, waving it in their faces. "Is nothing, it isn't you! So, do you know what we are going to do with it?" He waved the paper again and both John and Buffy shook their heads and then the principal then grasped the paper by the edges and tore it in half down the middle. "Nothing! It is not you! A fresh start! That's what you get here Buffy, no judgements over some nonsense in the past. I mean honestly, it was nothing. All you did was-"

Flutie went silent as he stared at one of the halves of paper, when he looked back up at them his face had gone pale and when he tried to smile it was clearly more than a little pained. "Well, I am sure there were circumstances and of course you will still get your fair chance but let me just say that while we at Sunnydale High are committed to helping any troubled student rehabilitate themselves." Flutie then reached out for a piece of tape to put the halves back together again.

"Principal Flutie-

"All the kids here are free to call me Bob."

"Bob-

"But they don't."

John frowned and was about to ask him why he had even brought it up but his sister spoke before he could. "I know my transcripts are a little...colorful."

"Oh, don't worry about that!" The principal said with a forced smile as he picked up another piece of tape and used it to bind the torn halves back together again. "But um, colorful? Are you sure that's the right word for it? Not...dismal."

"It wasn't really all that bad!"

"You burned down the Gym!"

"I did, but there were circumstances! That gym was full of Vampir-" His sister stopped talking as both the Principal and John himself looked at her intently, the Principal out of confusion no doubt but John was more out of concern than anything else. Buffy had started talking about Vampires just before their parents had decided to send her to that damn mental hospital.

John wasn't going to say anything of course, if their Mom thought that she was having a relapse then she would have her sent away as soon as she could and John wasn't going to be able to bear that. Buffy at least did seem to understand that she shouldn't carry on as she quickly glanced at John and then back over to the Principal. "Asbestos, it was full of it. Honestly, the fire made it safer."

"Right." Flutie said after a moment of silence that seemed to stretch on for hours. "Well, our last investigation from the standards board gave us full marks on health so there's no reason to burn anything down here."

"Oh well that's good sis, we can leave the gas and the matches at home!" John said with a smile but when the Principal again looked like he was about to faint, seriously why had he decided to be a high school principal, it was a shock that this guy hadn't been eaten alive by now. "That was a joke, by the way. A bad joke, really bad."

"It was a joke of a joke." Buffy said and she was now glaring at him and John knew that once they were home he wasn't going to hear the end of this. "Principle Flutie, I promise you that nothing bad is going to happen here. Everything's going to be good."

"Well, that's very good. We want to help you here Buffy, we really do. We want to support you and help you with all of your needs, and have you respect our needs as well. And if your needs, and our needs don't match. Well." He put the repaired page, and calling it that was a stretch if John was going to be honest, back in the folder and slammed it shut to emphasize his point.

"Right, well that's very clear." Flutie dismissed Buffy then but when John tried to stand up to join her the Principal told him to stay and then bid him to sit back down, John did so and Buffy left the room.

"Now then." Flutie picked up another folder, opened it and glanced through it. "Compared to your sister, you are the perfect sort of student for Sunnydale High. A solid student, if not exceptional, not much for the extracurricular things. Yes, I think you are going to be the perfect student. I would ask John that you make sure to keep an eye on your sister, she has a fresh start here like I said but if she isn't careful well, we'd hate for her fresh start to rot before we get her out of the ground, if you know what I mean?"

Well, the metaphor was a little tortured in John's opinion but he wasn't about to argue. Things were hard enough as it is. For all of them. "Don't worry sir!" John said, trying to force a cheerful smile on to his face even if he didn't truly feel it. "Buffy won't cause any trouble, she's not bad. It's just-" How could he explain what he didn't understand, Buffy's weird change in attitude, distancing herself from all her friends, hanging out with that gross Pike guy and burning down the Gym, it had all come out of nowhere.

But he couldn't say that of course, this guy seemed about ready to jump at his own shadow and if he thought that Buffy was liable to just suddenly snap and start burning down school buildings then he might kick her out and then they would have to move again, or Buffy would get kicked out and get no education which was probably more likely as their mom had fought so hard to get this new job at this art gallery.

"Buffy was around some bad influences at our old school." That sounded good enough at the very least, nice and non specific. "You know how LA is after all, I'm just surprised that no one had burnt down a school building before there." Okay pull it back. "Anyway, I promise, there won't be any problems here. You have my word."

"Well, that's good." Flutie glanced down at his desk and then sucked his breath through his teeth. "Ah shoot, I forgot to give your sister her book list for her classes." The principal reached down and picked up two pieces of paper and handed them to John. "Why don't you go to the library and go and pick her books up for her?"

"That's a good idea, thank you sir." John really wanted to get going and so when Flutie gave him leave, he was out of there like a shot. He hurried down the corridors as quickly as he could and was at the library in no time at all.

When he walked into the library, he felt like he had suddenly been transported. He had been in an episode of some high school drama and he had walked into the setting of a Gothic horror novel. It was dark and the air was thick and the dust made his nose itch. The library back in Hemry had been nothing like this, the sun had streamed in through the windows and it had never been quiet at all.

Here, you could hear a pin drop. Or a stack of books being dropped, which happened up there on the raised platform at the back of the library where half a dozen bookshelves stood next to one another. A man who honestly looked like he should be working as a butler and not in a high school library walked out from in between two of the shelves, holding his books, looking down at then and not taking any notice of John.

"Um, excuse me?" The man looked up from his books and he looked shocked, as if it was the most surprising thing in the world that someone would try and come into the library. "Sorry, I didn't meant to interrupt you but I'm a new student and I don't have any of my books for classes and stuff and Principal Flutie gave me a list for books I would need and said to come here."

"Yes, yes of course." The man reached up with one hand to push his glasses back up the bridge of his nose and then walked down the steps to the main level of the library, placing the books he was carrying on the large table in the middle of the room before he walked through a small side door which lead behind the large counter which took up one entire side of the room..

The man took his list first and looked over what it said. He nodded. "Yes, I see. One moment." He walked out of the check out area and walked back up the platform to gather the books. "So, your first day I assume?"

"Yeah, me and my family just moved here from LA." John said as he leaned against the counter top of check out area. "We only got into town a couple of days ago."

Something odd happened then, the man stopped moving as he was about to take the next book of off the shelves. He turned his head towards him and looked at him for a few moments before he cleared his throat. "That's nice, well, I do hope that you enjoy it here. LA, you said?"

"Yeah, long way from home. But I guess not quite so long as you, huh?" John asked as he pushed himself away from the counter and moved closer to the table, crossing his arms over his chest. "Just noticed your accent, your from England, right? I'm John, by the way."

"A pleasure to meet you Mr Summers." The man said absentmindedly as he picked another book up from the shelves. "And yes, I am from England. Funnily enough, I only just moved here a couple of days ago myself. Odd how these things turn out, isn't it? Oh, an I am Mr. Giles." He picked up two more books and walked down the stairs and back through the door that lead to the checkout area and John walked back up to the counter.

"Right then, this should have you sorted."

"Ah cool, you're a life saver." John said with a smile as he picked up his books, fitting two of them into his backpack so he could more easily carry the rest of them. "Oh, that reminds me." He dug into the pocket of his jeans and fished out Buffy's book list. "My sister, she started to day as well but Mr. Flutie forgot to give her this list."

Mr. Giles took the list like it was something precious and then nodded. "Yes of course, Mr Summers you should hurry along. I doubt it will be very much longer before classes start. Do not worry, your sister will no doubt find her way to me in time and I will give her all the books that she will require." John stopped and thought for a moment before he shrugged his shoulders.

"Okay then, thanks a lot Mr. Giles." And with that, he left the library and began to make his way down the corridors to his first class, which according to his schedule was algebra and John wondered why it couldn't have been him that his sister had set on fire, when suddenly something had occurred to him. Something that sent a chill down John's spine.

He hadn't told Mr. Giles what his last name was, and yet he knew that it was Mr. Summers...

Then he laughed at himself for being stupid, he knew that there were a pair of new kids starting today so of course he would know their names and his full name had been on the book list. Of course he would know his full name, there was nothing odd about that.

John shook his head and walked into the classroom and took his seat, determined that nothing was going to ruin this new school or this new town for them and for everything that seemed odd at first glance, there was always going to be a logical explanation in the end.

Now, all he had to do was survive algebra.

End of Chapter One

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**I hope that everyone enjoyed this chapter as we get into canon properly. Next chapter, John meets Xander, Willow, Cordelia and Jesse.**

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**With a ton of love,**

**DiscordantSymphony**


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